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Gaining Respect and Gratitude from the Business Traveller

• Identify the needs of the business traveler
• Understand the itinerary
• Check all the possible routings
• Match the traveler's requirements to the company's travel policy
• Select the best flights and the best hotels
• Check all the tickets and related documentation
• Brief the traveler

Some ways you can do your job as a travel planner better

• Identify the needs of the business traveler

You know the preferences of the people you arrange travel for. This is more than just knowing about a preference for non-smoking rooms. As you deal with your traveller on a regular basis you will get to know their airline, room facilities and route preferences. All this information should be stored on a profile.

• Understand the planned itinerary

Look carefully at the dates and timings. Will the traveller have to rush? Is the hotel selected in the best position for all his meetings? Will he have a free afternoon with no idea how to fill the time? You have the skills and tools to suggest improvements to the itinerary, to select a hotel with a better location for this trip, to suggest an earlier flight or to recommend an interesting attraction for the free afternoon. Your traveler may not want any changes, but he or she will appreciate your care.

• Check all the possible routings

We have seen that there are many possible ways of getting from A to B. In Unit 4, we saw many routes where there is a choice of airports for the traveller to change planes. One may offer better facilities, another might offer business opportunities. For example, 9 hours in Hong Kong would be plenty of time for a business meeting.

• Match the traveler's requirements to the company's travel policy

The company's travel policy is obviously not there to be broken or ignored. You can be sure that some of your business travelers know how to 'bend the rules'.

• Select the best flights and the best hotels
• Check all the tickets and related documentation

Check all tickets and documents very carefully. Are all the dates and times correct. Be particularly careful about departure times after midnight.

• Brief the traveller

Business travellers have many things on their minds - mostly to do with business! Don't be afraid to add many details to the printed itinerary. They may not remember anything you tell them before departure, but they'll read and check the itinerary many times during the trip. Where a ticket has a fare basis with fixed dates and times, make sure your traveler knows that it cannot be used for another flight.

You will have seen throughout the units that there are always many choices available when selecting flights and hotels. When selecting these always keep in mind the traveler's likes and dislikes, as well as company travel policy.

If a traveller regularly changes times of flights because of work problems, make sure that traveler has a fully flexible ticket (when company policy allows).